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Still without a deal struck as the sides approach mid-September, a new team has emerged as a potential landing spot for Tampa Bay Lightning restricted free agent
Nikita Kucherov.
According to
Igor Eronko of the Sports-Express, CSKA Moscow of the KHL have made a contract offer to Kucherov, though Eronko adds that there’s no ‘real’ dialogue between the parties.
CSKA, with ex-NHLers from Viktor Fasth to Stephane Da Costa to Jan Mursak, are off to the best start in the KHL, with six wins and 18 points in seven games played, along with the second-most goals as a team thus far (their 25 are second to only SKA St. Petersburg, a star-studded group with 27 goals).
It’s perhaps worth noting that the 23-year-old Kucherov, who led the Lightning in scoring in both the regular season and postseason this past year, did begin his career with CSKA Moscow back in 2010, and tallied one goal and six points in 26 games for the club over the course of two seasons.
But the Lightning are not yet worrying about outside offers thrown Kucherov’s way.
“That’s the goal,” Lightning general manager and vice president
Steve Yzerman said on Thursday when asked of the plan to get Kucherov (and Nikita Nesterov) re-upped by the time they return back to Tampa from the World Cup of Hockey, where they’re skating for Team Russia.
The Lightning have over $6.5 million in cap space to their name, and it’s expected that Kucherov’s new deal (barring a bridge deal) could take up almost all of that cap space, if not more.
A staple of the Lightning top six, Kucherov has recorded 67 goals and 148 points in 211 NHL games.
Ty Anderson has been covering the National Hockey League for HockeyBuzz.com since 2010, has been a member of the Pro Hockey Writers Association's Boston Chapter since 2013, and can also be read in the New England Hockey Journal magazine. Contact him on Twitter or send him an email at Ty.AndersonHB[at]gmail.com.
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